Koha Question of the Week: Who Might Find the Batch Patrons Permissions Modifier Plugin Useful?

by Hebah Amin-Headley on Jun 16, 2023

Each Friday, we will bring you a new Koha Question of the Week. We will select real questions that we receive and share the answers with you!

Question: Who Might Find the Batch Patrons Permissions Modifier Plugin Useful?

Answer: Partners who learn about the batch patrons permissions plugin are often excited to see if it is a tool that can save them time setting up account permissions, but it is a tool that will work better for some scenarios than others.

Modifying patron permissions in bulk will work well for partners where staff roles are fairly uniform and for libraries that have a person who can coordinate staff additions and departures. Academic libraries where student workers have separate accounts and perform similar duties are the most common use case here - the position has enough turnover that managing permissions by plugin is a timesaver to avoid having to manually set multiple users with the same set of permissions at the beginning of a new semester.

Large consortia are often tempted by the plugin to centralize and make permissions and access consistent across roles and locations, but they often run into the question of "who monitors staff hiring and departures?" If they have a staff member dedicated to keeping up on staffing changes and access, the plugin is a good option. However, for looser consortia or large public libraries where hiring is less centralized and/or job roles are less uniform, the plugin will not necessarily be the best way to handle staff permissions.

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